1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to drill guides for guiding drills during surgical procedures. More particularly, this invention relates to drill guides for positioning drills during orthopedic surgical procedures. Still more particularly, this invention relates to drill guides for positioning drill bits during arthroscopic repair of anterior and posterior cruciate ligaments.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Drill guides for positioning drill bits during arthroscopic surgical procedures are well known. Generally, such drill guides comprise a generally C-shaped structure in which one end of the C is situated at a point on the tibial plateau, representing one end of a tibial bone tunnel, and another point at the other end of the C representing the entry point of the tibial tunnel. (An example of such a guide is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,154,720 (Trott et al.) assigned to the assignee hereof and incorporated herein.) Guiding structures are attached in order to enable a user to drill from one end of the C to the other to thereby create a bone tunnel which will ultimately be used to anchor one end of a graft replacement ligament.
Recently, cruciate ligament repair procedures have evolved into the use of a “double bundle” technique in order to more accurately approximate the anatomical structure of an original ACL. The prior art double bundle technique requires the formation of two bone tunnels in the tibia, one for each bundle of the replacement ligament graft, and two corresponding bone tunnels in the femur. The present invention relates to a guide for properly locating and forming two modified tibial bone tunnels.
It is accordingly an object of this invention to provide a double bundle tibial guide to accurately position the exit of both tibial bone tunnels on the tibial plateau.
It is another object of this invention to provide a guide to accurately position the exit of two bone tunnels on a selected bone surface.
It is yet another object of this invention to accurately position both tunnels relative to each other.